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Books for the Wannabe Geek

Throwing things in Motion 5

Motion 5 is all about getting things to move on the screen and creating video animations. In this video we are going to have a look at how we can place object on the screen and then have them move from one place to another. So in the library I found a graphic element of a buzzing bee and I explore a number of different ways of making the be bee move. One easy way of making the object move is to use the throw behaviour. All you have to do is to select the behaviour from the Motion library for behaviours and drag it onto your object in the list of objects in the Motion work area. You drag from the centre of the circle in the HUD which controls the behaviour and the further you drag the arrow, the further the objects will move and also the faster the object will move. You may need to zoom out a little bit if you need to drag the arrow further away from the centre.

Follow the path in Motion 5

If you want to have something more than your object moving in a straight line which you get by using the throw behaviour or using the move behaviour then you need to use something like the tool to make it follow a path. You can create a path that can have curves and these lines will have nodes that are controlled by bezier control points. This works the same way as when you are constructing a line in an illustration application such as Illustrator. It is quite easy to either get a path which is flowing with curves or you can make one which can have sharper angles. Once you have placed your line onto the canvas you can then hide it so that only the movement of the object is seen.

Making video animation in the Motion 5

Open up your Motion 5 application on your Mac and practice using some of the various tools available for giving your objects movement. It is easy to animate text in Motion 5. You will soon see that with this application it is very simple to create incredible video animation effects that will look quite professional. To a large extent the only limits will be the creative imagination that you have. It is also possible to work in a 3-D space in motion 5.

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